Magazine cigarette lighter for automobiles



Dec. 22, 1953 CRONAN 2,663,606

MAGAZINE CIGARETTE LIGHTER FOR AUTOMOBILES Filed June 6, 1950 [H van for.

C/fffo/"d 5. 670mm.

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Fig. 5.

Patented Dec. 22, 1953 MAGAZINE CIGARETTE LIGHTER FOR AUTOMOBILES- Clifford B. Cronan, West Newton, Mass. Application June 6, 1950, Serial No. 166,453

6 Claims. (Cl; 312-86) This invention relates to magazine cigarette lighters particularly adapted for use in automobiles. Most automobiles are equipped with a cigarette lighter socket into which is plugged a lighter unit including a coil adapted to be electrically heated to incandescence when the unit is forced inwardly to contacting position. The driver, desiring a cigarette, is required first to find his pack and extract a cigarette and then operate the lighter and apply it to the cigarette. These operations are not only inconvenient but dangerous unless the driver stops his car. The primary object of my invention resides in the production of an improved lighting cigarette dispenser adapted to plug into the socket and provided with a magazine for holding a plurality of cigarettes. When the driver desires a cigarette he merely pushes a button inwardly and one of the cigarettes is delivered to him lighted and ready for use.

My improved cigarette lighting dispenser is preferably made conveniently small and open at the to to receive a small number of cigarettes of either standard or king size and either round or oval. The magazine preferably comprises an open cup within which is a turret provided with compartments to receive the cigarettes. When the operator starts on a trip he drops a cigarette into each compartment with the exception of the delivery station and these cigarettes are thereupon ready to be dispensed as required. The cup is furthermore formed with an inclined recess at its forward portion into which the lighted cigarette drops by gravity to a position conveniently available to the user.

Further novel features of the invention include a thermostat disposed about the igniting coil in such position that the thermostat shields the coil against the escape of heatand the heat of the coilaids the operation of the thermostat. The thermostat is of horseshoe shape and includes two relatively adjacent ends arranged to cooperate with a switch contact pin. Movement of the manually operated dispenser button inwardly serves simultaneously to index the turret and move the switch contact pin into latching engagement with said two ends of the thermostat. Heating and expanding of the thermostat a predetermined amount thereafter causes release of the pin and breaking of the heatingcircuit. The production of an improved mechanism of this nature comprises a further object of the invention.

These and other features of the invention will be best understood and appreciated from the following description of a preferred embodiment of the invention selected for purposes of illusing in which-- Fig. 1 is a side elevation of my lighting cigarette dispenser,

Fig. 2 is a plan view,

Fig. 3 is front elevation,

Fig. l is a sectional view taken on line 4-4 of Fig. 2, and

Fig. 5 is a plan section taken on line 5-5 oi Fig. 4-.

In the drawing, It indicates the dash of an automobile and ii the cigarette lighter socket mounted therein. The socket has a terminal contact at it from which a wire Iii leads to the hat tery It. The grounded wall of the socket serves as the other terminal contact. The socket is adapted to receive the usual cigarette lighting unit embodying a coil with terminals disposed to engage the contact it and the grounded contact when pushed into the socket to operative position.

My improved lighting cigarette dispenser, as illustrated in the drawing, comprises a box-like body it having a cup-shaped cigarette maga zine l9 thereon and an adapter it carried by and extending laterally from the body, the adapter being constructed to plug into the cigarette lighter socket and including electro-conductive contacts arranged to engage the contacts in the socket when the adapter is plugged thereinto as illustrated in Fig. l. The cylindrical body of the adapter serves as the ground-contact and the other contact comprises a member 22 riveted to and insulated from the cylindrical body and carrying a conductive bar 23' arranged to make contact with a leaf 2c in the body I 8. The adapter is detachably mounted on a collar 26" carried by the body and secured thereto by a bayonet joint 2?. This construction provides for emplaying adapters of different lengths to accommodate sockets of different lengths in various automobiles.

A cigarette holding turret including a shaft 28 and a plurality of radial vanes 36 is mounted in the cup [9, the shaft being rotatably supported at its bottom end in the body it. A cigarette lighting coil 32 is mounted in the body forwardly of the shaft 28 and the inner end of the coil is supported on a post it connected to the conducting leaf 24'. The outer end of the coil is connected to a post 34 on which is mounted a thermostat 36. The thermostat is of horseshoe shape and embodies two arms substantially surrounding the coil and extending from the post 34 to relatively adjacent free ends 31. As illustrated in the drawing, the cup l9 together with the turret 28-39 and the cigarettes therein are I disposed, vertically whereby the cigarettes can be dropped endwise into the turret and the foremost cigarette can drop endwise by gravity into contact with the lighting coil 32. It will be apparent that by vertical I mean sufficiently vertical to perform these functions of the invention which obviously do not require exact vertical disposition of these parts.

A contact member or pin 38 is carried by a slide it mounted to move forwardly-rearwardly in the body It and is disposed to engage the ends 37 of the thermostat when pushed. rearwardly by engaging the thumb against the operating button 42 mounted on the forward end of the slide. The pin 38 is grounded to the body and its contact with the ends S'l of the thermostat completes the circuit through the coil and thermostat. Rearward movement of the pin springs the arms apart which thereupon latch the pin in the engagement illustrated in Fig. 5. The heat from the coil and the passage of electric current through the thermostat causes the arms to spring apart to a position releasing the pin after a predetermined cigarette lighting p riod whereupon a spring 3 moves the slide and pin outwardly to the position indicated in broken lines in Fig. 5.

Also carried by the slide ii; on a post at is a pawl fill arranged to engage a ratchet 5i: fixed to the turret shaft 23. A spring 52 on the post normally holds the pawl with the ratchet.

Rearward movement of the slide operates through the pawl and ratchet to index the turret and a second pawl is provided to prevent reverse rotation of the ratchet and turret.

The body it is preferably made in two parts inter-engaged by rabbeted guideways at whereby the body and parts therein can be conveniently assembled and disassembled. The top wall of the body 8 serves as a bottom wall for the cup 19 and a hole 5'2 is provided through this wall above and in alignment with the igniting coil 32 whereby a cigarette brought to a position forwardly or" the shalt '28 drops downwardly into electro-conductive contact carried by and insulated from the adapter for engaging a cooperating contact in the socket when the adapter is plugged thereinto, a cigarette lighting coil in the body beneath the cup, means including a thermostatic element and a switch contact associated therewith providing an electric circuit through the coil and to said contact insulated from the adapter, and manually operated means for simultaneously closing said switch contact and rotating the turret to a position dispensing a cigarette therefrom vertically and axially into end contact with the coil, passage oi electric current through the circuit being adapted to heat and cause expansion of the thermostatic element to a position opening said switch contact in the circuit.

2. The cigarette dispenser defined in claim 1 plus a supporting bottom wall for the cigarettes with a hole therethrough above and in alignment with the coil, the portion of the cup wall disposed adjacent to said hole being inclined outwardly upwardly to provide a cigarette receiving pocket into which the cigarette engaging the coil can fall outwardly by gravity to convenient grasping position.

3. The cigarette dispenser defined in claim 1 in which the thermostatic element is adjacent to and substantially surrounds the cigarette lighting coil.

The cigarette dispenser defined in claim 3 in which the thermostatic element is mounted on a post in the body at one side of the coil and includes two arms extending therefrom to relatively adjacent free ends at the opposite side of the coil, and said switch contact comprises a contact member carried by said manually operated means and disposed to cooperate with all) the hole and into contact with the coil. The

portion of the cup wall disposed adjacent to the hole is inclined outwardly upwardly at to provide a cigarette receiving pocket into which the cigarette engaging the coil can fall by gravity to the convenient grasping position indicated in Fig. l. The letter C is used to indicate a cigarette.

The circuit through the heating coil 32 from the positive contact .22 back to the negative contact 2c is as follows: contact 22, contact bars 23 and as, post 33, coil 32, post 34, thermostat arms 37, grounded svitch contact pin 38 and contact 25. As illustrated in Fig. l, the posts 33 and 3:! are mounted on a platform 33 of insulation material. For convenient assembly, this platform is slidably supported at opposite margins 35 on the side walls of the forward portion ll oi"- the body member 58.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent isl. A lighting magazine cigarette eispenser for automobiles, comprising a box-like body, a substantially vertically disposed cup thereon open at the top, a rotary cigarette holding turret dis posed axially in the cup and adapted to hold a plurality of cigarettes disposed substantially vertically about the turret axis, a cylindrical adapter carried by and in electro-conductive contact with and extending laterally from the body and adapted to plug into the cylindrical cigarette. lighter socket of an automobile, an

said free ends.

5. The cigarette dispenser defined in claim a in which said contact member is disposed to en gage and separate said free ends when forced inwardly into contact therewith and said free ends are disposed to snap into latching engagement with said member, and a spring disposed to move the manually operated means and member outwardly when said arms expand sufiiciently to release the free ends from latching engagement with said member.

6. The cigarette dispenser defined in claim 1 in which the adapter is detachably supported on an annular collar carried by and disp sed laterally of said body.

' CLIFFORD B. CRONAN.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS Number Name Date 928,474 Salt July 20, 1909 1,254,482 Berg Apr. 30, 1918 1,559,684 Douglas Nov. 3, 1925 1,800,085 Vierling Apr. 7, 1931 1,838,363 Copeland Dec. 29, 1931 1,898,077 Bowman Feb. 21, 1933 1,917,563 Werner July ll, 1938 1,991,258 Pflaging Feb. 12, 1935 2,117,703 Cohen May 17, 1938 2,129,374 Johnson Sept. 6, 1938 2,216,675 Prescott et a1. Oct. 1, 1940 2,243,889 Shively June 3, 1941 2,277,451 Paseka Mar. 24, 1942 2,305,084 Johnson Dec. 15, 1942 2,422,478

Geller et a1 June 17, 1947 

